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Legion TV series shows how being Mad One can be great!

02-10-2017, 05:55 PM

If you did not watch this TV series about Mastigos being thrown as lunatic by Sleepers to institution - leading him to becoming real Mad One mage - then you need to catch up. Like now - you will thank me later.

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Character can have Gnosis not knowing he has Gnosis. How other way we would have superpowerful Banishers?

Can they?
They don't see it as a stat, but from my reading, being the knowledge/understanding of magic, Banishers have it, are aware of it, think using it to change reality is evil.
Thus do Banishers target Mages and supernal magic shenanigans for destruction, and you won't have a Banisher go "magic isn't real, I'm hallucinating."

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Beaing Mad One ( and normal mad ) do not prevents you from understanding reality ( having Arcana ) on instinct level. Hell, it's even why can cast spells just after Awakening - not many people will connect 'I had a real weird dream' with 'I can cast magic!' - even if starting mage character just after Awakening surely can cast spells. They just form Imago on instinctual levels, bypassing their conscious minds.

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Beaing Mad One ( and normal mad ) do not prevents you from understanding reality ( having Arcana ) on instinct level. Hell, it's even why can cast spells just after Awakening - not many people will connect 'I had a real weird dream' with 'I can cast magic!' - even if starting mage character just after Awakening surely can cast spells. They just form Imago on instinctual levels, bypassing their conscious minds.

Wrong, unless you're Mad then in Awakening magic is always an active effort of the will. Mages do not cast without realizing it the need for attention to detail in an imago is too great to allow it to happen by accident. They might not know that what they're doing is magic because they haven't been introduced yet to the lexicon of Mages, but they know exactly what they're doing.

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Wrong, unless you're Mad then in Awakening magic is always an active effort of the will. Mages do not cast without realizing it the need for attention to detail in an imago is too great to allow it to happen by accident. They might not know that what they're doing is magic because they haven't been introduced yet to the lexicon of Mages, but they know exactly what they're doing.

It depends of what you describe as 'accident' - if you are fresh Awakened, unknown if and go with 'I wish she would love me' - your Arcana will try to cast spell.

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It depends of what you describe as 'accident' - if you are fresh Awakened, unknown if and go with 'I wish she would love me' - your Arcana will try to cast spell.

No, it won't, unless you deliberately and consciously form an imago to try and force her to love you with magic. Whether or not you realize you're doing magic at the time is irrelevant, you know you're doing -something- and if you succeed know it's because of what you did. Your arcana don't have a mind of their own unless you go Mad.

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Don't you mean Wisdom?
Without Gnosis there is no magic, voluntary or otherwise.

I do not. Without Gnosis there is no supernal magic, but there's a variety of ways to get magic-esque effects. Even some that one might call magic, but the kind that isn't of the supernal, of Mages from Mage: the Awakening.
Not trying to shoehorn Legion into it,but an example that comes to mind is the psionics of the Trinity Continuum, they can warp things and telekinticise(I made it into a verb :P)

wyrdhamster : Like Mrmdubois said, you know what you're doing when you're casting a spell. And you have to understand at a deep level that is how things work. Gnosis + Arcana ratings mean you know magic, even if you don't call it that.

From the MtA setting, the protagonist could be a shiny new Proximus. And it sucks for him that he doesn't know how to deal with his curse, so his blessings overwhelm him.

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1. In MtAw setting, Legion is clearly Mad - his powers are open ended and he do not grasp them ( I. E. Wisdom 0 character).

2. Spellcasting do not need consiens using Arcana - it needs Imago of spell. From spellcasting part of 2E corebook:

The mage imagines each part of the spell in her mind before she casts it, envisioning the Imago of the spell. The Imago is the mental representation of the end result of the spell including all its effects and factors. Without the Imago, the mage is incapable of fully envisioning what she wants to impart into the world, her will incapable of imprinting the truth without a defined Pattern.

Newly Awakened can just imagine his future with the girl she likes and wanting it - and so the spell will be cast by him.

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That is a quote from the book and it's literally telling you that forming the Imago to cast a spell is a conscious effort that requires putting together all the spell factors and effects and you somehow think that casting a spell isn't a conscious effort? How do you even manage that level of dissonance? Holy shit.

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I'm not sure this would be a Mad One. The unfortunately named Mad are Wisdom 0 mages that have taken Obsessions to their furthest extreme. I'm not getting an obsession vibe off this character. He's trying to figure out who and what he is, sure, but that's not the same thing as an Obsession-cum-Fault. Mad Ones also seem to have people forget about their existance, as if they were a spell subject to Quiescence, which doesn't feel like the case here either. Mad Ones are also said to completely lack empathy, which this character clearly does possess.

The random spell effects should move the Mad back towards their Obsession. I'm not sure what aimlessly flying objects have to do with that, other than just losing control. That could just as easily be a sign of paradox. Or, just as possible, if not more plausable, a human psychic without willpower.

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I just read the series overview. Its all about a character who's coming to terms that the supernatural is real, that he is a "mutant," and what hes' going to do with it. That's a classic example of undergoing an Awakening, not a magical character who once had control over his power losing it as they are driven to extremes.